Water & Soap

Galatians 3:26-27

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A few years ago, I kept hearing ads on the radio advertising a carpet cleaning service which claimed to leave zero residue, and I was curious what that meant. And so I did a little investigating, a little research, and they claimed to do a superior job of cleaning your carpets, both because of what they don’t do or don’t use, and because of what they do use.

What they don’t use is regular soap or carpet shampoo. You see, soap, shampoo, works by binding to the particle of dirt or grease or some other grime, and then when it’s rinsed away, the soap and the dirt are rinsed away. Obviously, then you’d have to use enough soap to get all the dirt, but there’s a tendency for there to be left over, residual, soap. And that soap stays in the carpet. And maybe if you’ve ever shampooed your carpets, they seem to get dirty so quickly. According to this company that’s because of that residual soap that’s still there, and it’s actually attracting, grabbing hold of, new dirt where otherwise, you know, if there was nothing there, the dirt wouldn’t stick.

So this company claimed that they do a superior job because they don’t use soap or shampoo and because they use this: water. They just use water. Well, that got me thinking about our lives as Christians. We naturally tend to think of our status with God as something we’ve done. Some promise that we’ve made to him about how I’m going to live from here on out. And those are good things. Those are well meant, well intentioned things. I should promise to live my life according to Ten Commandments, but they don’t perfectly cleanse us. They don’t get us as clean as we need to be to be in God’s presence. We need to be completely cleansed of all our sin.

And so there’s this residue that’s left behind. But in baptism, in the simple water of baptism, we are cleansed. We are washed of all of our sins. Saint Paul said this to the Christians who lived in Galatia. Galatians 3:26 and 27.

For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. (Galatians 3:26-27)

That’s such a neat image that Paul gives us. Just as I am my mother’s son, a child of my mother, but I had absolutely nothing to do with that. And in the same way as Paul says, we are God’s children, sons of God through faith in Christ, the only begotten Son. Because as many of us as were baptized, as were washed with that water of baptism, have put on, have been clothed, covered with Christ. Covered with God’s only begotten child, God’s only begotten Son.

And so, while my works, my Christian life, certainly are important, and I must resolve to live a life in a way as God describes, that’s never going to cleanse me. Instead, baptism has already cleansed me. So put your faith. Put your trust, your hope in baptism. That’s not a symbol. It’s not a ceremony. It is God’s means of grace for cleansing you perfectly, completely, totally for creating you, recreating you to be one of his children, a child of God through faith. As many of you as were baptized into Christ have been dressed in, have put on Christ.

Until we see each other again. God bless and keep you in that faith cleansed, washed, clean and pure and the waters of your baptism. God bless and keep you. Amen.